Hello again baseball fans.  This installment finds me in the state capitol of the Keystone State and home of the National Civil War museum–Harrisburg, Pa.  (The Three Mile Island nuclear reactors are about 15 minutes up the road as well, but I’m guessing that isn’t a major selling point for most people).  All of which is entirely beside the point because I won’t actually get to see any of it, but nice to know it’s there I guess.  Since I last checked in I’ve thrown twice, spanning three innings and allowing two runs in somewhat contrasting fashions.  The first run scored after the hitter took a mighty hack and hit the ball all of six feet for a single and the other on a mega-blast solo home run that marred an otherwise excellent outing.  Pretty much a metaphor for my season to this point–very close but just not quite dialed all the way in.  I’m pretty satisfied with the way I threw, so the results will follow shortly I’m sure.  The good news though is that as a team we are off to an outstanding start (8-2) and everyone has managed to stay healthy to this point.  My main complaint is that with a day game Sunday, a rainout yesterday and a night game today it feels like I have been sitting in my hotel room since time untold.  Anyway, have a good Earth Day tomorrow and I’ll send you out with a poem as part of my continuing effort to promote National Poetry Month.

Scenic Route by Lisel Mueller

Someone was always leaving

and never coming back.

The wooden houses wait like old wives

along this road; they are everywhere,

abandoned, leaning, turning gray.

Someone always traded

the lonely beauty

of hemlock and stony lakeshore

for survival, packed up his life

and drove off to the city.

In the yards the apple trees

keep hanging on, but the fruit

grows smaller year by year.

When we come this way again

the trees will have gone wild,

the houses collapsed, not even worth

the human act of breaking in.

Fields will have taken over.

What we will recognize

is the wind, the same fierce wind,

which has no history.